Oops!

Mayor Marty Chavez is getting grief from the City Council on an $8 million dollar new tank at the aquarium at the Bio Park. Chavez says he will reconsider the recommendation after finding out a new police station was accidentally left out of the bond issue legislation. In defense of the Mayor, these kinds of mistakes do happen and from experience I can tell you that the city council will try to make more out of it than it is. The Mayor's reconsideration is sensible.

Having said that there are two other things about this story that bother me. One is the questionable need for another police station. Just look at all of the so called 'sub stations' around the city. Most of them are not functioning because of a lack of personnel. I can't remember the last time I saw the one at Rio Grande and Central used. What I do see there are officers in the parking lot exchanging reports with out ever going inside. Often, the building is totally unstaffed. I was against the funding of these white elephants when I was Mayor, but every city councillor wanted one in their district whether they were useful or not. I felt they cost annual operational dollars that kept more officers from patrolling on the streets.

Secondly, why do we need a 500k gallon tank at the bio park that allows scuba diving amidst the Pacific Ocean fish exhibit. It would be nice to have but the energy requirements will be massive. Usually, I like these kinds of educational projects but this one should have a very small energy footprint if it is to be built.

As I have said before, these bond issues need to be looked at for the amount of annual operational budgets they will create. A downturn in the economy spells disaster if we don't consider those consequences.